


A Fruitless Vine

by BiFelicia



Series: Hallmark [3]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Author Is Sleep Deprived, F/F, Fluff and Humor, The Author Regrets Nothing, Vine References Abound, cute nonsense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-31
Updated: 2019-01-31
Packaged: 2019-10-20 00:30:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17612006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BiFelicia/pseuds/BiFelicia
Summary: Lena doesn't understand Vines, and it takes a shockingly long time for anyone else to notice.





	A Fruitless Vine

It starts off so innocuous.

Winn sends out a video of himself in the Spider-Man pajamas Eliza sent him for his birthday to the group chat. In it, he’s standing in his bathroom wearing a swim mask and loudly declares, “It is Wednesday, my dudes!” before zooming out and screaming at his own reflection.

 

Jimmy: LOL

Lucy: Perfect. 

Maggie: Make sure to send that to Mom

Alex: YES. Kara showed her vines once and now she loves them.

Kara: As she should!

Lena finds the entire exchange a bit baffling, since it’s actually Sunday, but somewhat funny, so she sends a smiley face. It seems to be the appropriate reaction.

********

“Hello, _ehl_!” Kara breezes into Lena’s office and promptly collapses onto her couch face-first.

Lena chuckles, rounding her desk and sitting beside Kara’s head, running her fingers through Kara’s tangled hair. “Hello, darling. How was your day?”

“Ugh. Exams all day. I know I like, try not to swear-” Lena’s eyebrows rise. “-but honestly, mother- _trucker_ , my brain hurts like a buttcheek on a stick.”

Lena blinks. “I… I have no response to that.”

Kara just laughs.

********

“Luuuuuuce, I want juice!” Winn yells.

“Schott, for fucks sake, I am three feet away, your apartment is tiny, shut up.” Lucy stalks over to the couch and snatches the empty glass Winn’s holding aloft. “Next time we’re doing movie night at Lena’s, she has the biggest TV.” Lucy opens the refrigerator and grabs the juice carton. She shakes it experimentally before huffing. Suddenly, a gleam shines in her eye, one Lena has become _far_ too familiar with over the past several months for comfort. Lucy clears her throat theatrically until she gets everyone’s attention.

“What, Lucy?”

She takes a deep breath before bellowing, “This bitch empty. _YEET_!” and hurling the empty carton as hard as she can at Winn’s head.

It bounces off with a hollow _thump_! Winn blinks at her for a moment before laughing so hard he cries. “Oh my _god_ , that was _perfect_. I’m so mad we didn’t get that on video, Maggie would love it.”

The other people in the room are _also_ laughing really hard, and meanwhile, Lena’s just… very confused, and mildly concerned about the bruise starting to form on Winn’s forehead.

She decides to get him some ice.

********

“Hi, Lena!” Kara presses a quick kiss to Lena’s temple and rests her chin on her shoulder, slipping strong arms around her waist.

“Hello, darling.” Lena’s enjoying a rare evening off, and has decided to try out a recipe Eliza sent her several weeks ago for guacamole, and along the way it’s become some sort of Tex-Mex night for dinner. “I hope you’re hungry.”

“I’m _always_ hungry, and this smells awesome! Need any help?”

“Actually, I can’t find my oven mitts anywhere, so if you could get the enchiladas out of the oven for me?”

“Stand back, fair maiden! Supergirl is on the case!” She lifts Lena bodily out of her way, holding her up with one hand and fishing the pan on enchiladas from the oven with the other. She sets them on the stovetop before gently placing Lena back on her feet. “See? Easy-peasy.”

Lena rolls her eyes fondly. “You’re ridiculous.”

“But you love me?”

“You know I do.”

“Good.” This is punctuated with another kiss, this time on Lena’s shoulder, before Kara moves to the cupboard to pull down plates and glasses. “Anything else I can help with?”

“Yes, start putting the food on the table if you would. Oh! And I tried out that recipe Eliza sent for the guacamole.”

“Oh, nice! Did it call for _freesh avaca-doo_?” Kara asks, giggling at her own joke.

Lena’s brow furrows. “What?”

“Y’know, _freesh avaca-doo_? Green stuff, our generation puts it on toast?”

Lena bites her lip. She knows that English isn’t Kara’s first language- in fact, it’s her _eighth_ -, but she’s never heard her mangle a word the way she just did avocado. She debates letting it slide, but after months of dating, Lena knows that Kara will _definitely_ get embarrassed if she says the word wrong in public. She decides that a gentle correction is best. “Yes, I used fresh avocado. What else would I use for guacamole?”

Kara chuckles. “You’re so dang cute, _ehl_.”

Lena isn’t sure _why_ she’s suddenly cute, but she decides that she’ll take it when Kara pulls her into a kiss.

********

Kara’s dragged them all to the beach during a visit from Clark, Lois, Maggie, and Alex. They’re getting everything set up when the group notices a large swath of the beach nearby has been completely taken over by seagulls.

Maggie, who’s setting up a beach tent for the paler member of their party (Lena and Winn, the damn _nerds_ ), spots the birds first. Turning to the rest of the group, she plasters a large smile on her face. “Look at all those _chickens_!”

The others crack up. Alex actually drops to the sand, laughing.

“Dude, perfectly executed, 10/10, would laugh again,” Winn wheezes.

“I give it a nine,” James says. At Maggie’s dirty look, he raises his hands defensively. “Hey, man, you didn’t lisp. How am I gonna give you a perfect score if you don’t lisp, Sawyer?”

Maggie opens her mouth to argue, but snaps it shut with a very put-upon sigh. “Fine.”

Lena finds herself, once again, completely confused. Because what Maggie said really _wasn’t_ all that funny, and honest to god, those are _seagulls_.

But then again, her friends are _exceptionally_ strange.

So she lets the others have their fun, even if she _really_ doesn’t understand what’s funny.

********

“Boo-yah! All of you can kiss my human _ass_! You _suck_ at this!” Winn jeers, collecting his winnings from the middle of the table.

“Alright, man, easy.”

“No, seriously, why do you all suck so bad?”

“Winn…”

“I am still waiting for you all to kiss my ass, so.”

“Alright, that’s it, you’re in time out. Get on top of the fridge.”

Lena blinks before her brow furrows. She _must’ve_ heard that incorrectly.

But no. Winn groans and stands up from the table, exaggerated movements meaning only that he’s trying not to laugh. He plods over to the countertop before he does, indeed, climb up onto it, then the fridge, loudly declaring, “This house is a fucking _prison_!”

Lena casts a furtive look around, hoping to find someone, _anyone_ , as confused as she is, but they all look various degrees of amused and exasperated.

 

Later that night, Winn exacts his revenge by putting Kara (who’d gotten over-zealous while playing Mario Kart) into timeout.

On top of the TV stand.

Honestly, at this point, Lena just decides to give up and accept their insanity.

********

Lena’s topping off her glass of wine, wandering through James and Lucy’s apartment, when she hears the familiar sound of Kara’s laughter and Lucy’s voice. She smiles to herself and follows it to the small den area where the best friends are sitting on the couch, evidently deep into a story. Not wanting to interrupt, but also not wanting to leave, Lena leans her shoulder against the doorframe and takes a sip of her wine.

This proves to be a mistake.

Lucy’s gesticulating wildly. “…so I’m standing there, barbeque sauce on my titties…”

Lena sprays wine halfway across the room and starts to choke.

“Oh shit! Lena, hey, deep breaths!” Lucy hurries over and pounds on her back.

Lena finally manages to suck in a breath. “What the _shit_ , Lane?”

Lucy just laughs and rubs her back until she stops coughing.

********

Winn walks out into his living room in his footie pajamas, and Lucy doesn’t waste a moment before dropping to her knees and yelling, “What are _those_?!” and gesturing dramatically at his feet.

He looks down at the attached slippers and tells her, “These are my _crocs_.”

Kara loses it.

Lena’s pretty sure the slippers are actually alligators.

********

“Why do we have to go to the pool? I think that if we’re both going to be mostly naked, there are better ways to get wet,” Lena husks, waggling her eyebrows at Kara.

Kara laughs. “Okay, first of all, clever.”

“Thank you.”

“Second, we’re on vacation in the Bahamas with our friends and family- a vacation we _totally_ deserve, by the way, after the year we’ve had... It’s beautiful outside, and everyone is waiting for us, no matter how much you pout.” Kara pecks Lena’s lips with a grin. “And lastly, you’re already coated in at least a quarter-inch of sunscreen. I’m pretty sure one of us would just, like, _slide_ right off the other at this point.”

Lena snorts. “Excellent points, Miss Danvers.”

“I try. C’mon, let’s go.”

Lena heaves another sigh but takes Kara’s proffered hand as they make their way downstairs.

 

The nice thing about owning a hotel, Lena decides, is the fact that she can just… decide that one of the pools is going to be private for the duration of her visit. So their ragtag group of 10 has a large pool all to themselves.

Kara whoops when they arrive, leaping high into the air and hitting the water with an almighty splash.

“Darling, keep some water _in_ the pool, please,” Lena chides, settling under the cabana with a scientific journal.

Alex and Lois are in there as well, and they all spend some time sipping mimosas and enjoying the shade, when suddenly Lois nudges Alex. “Hey Red, Little Luthor, look.”

Lena looks up to see James and Clark in the hot tub, sitting across from each other, laughing and talking.

Lois cups her hands around her mouth and shouts _“Two bros, chillin’ in a hot tub!”_

And somehow, everyone else knows to yell back, _“Five feet apart, because they’re not gay!”_ James and Clark, for their parts, just roll their eyes good-naturedly and continue talking.

“Okay, what _is_ that?!” Lena asks, once most of the laughter has subsided. “Why is that so funny?”

“It’s a vine, Luthor,” Alex laughs. “Duh.”

“A _what_?”

“A vine. Y’know, vines,” Lois says, gesturing vaguely.

“I have- what do vines have to do with any of this?”

Winn pulls himself out of the pool and pads over to them, dripping wet and quickly followed by Kara. “You- oh my god, you have no idea what vines are, do you?”

“Well, judging by the context of this conversation, I’m guessing that I don’t,” Lena says wryly. “What’s a vine?”

“Oh, _Rao_ , no wonder you never laugh! I thought you just hated them, or something. What a relief, I thought I was gonna have to return you,” Kara teases. She rummages around in her bag before producing her phone. “Alright, scoot, your education begins _now_.”

Lena shuffles over on her lounge chair to make room for Kara, and Winn drags another one over so he can assist in choosing the best of the best. And then Alex and Lois join in, which means that everyone _else_ joins in, and soon they’re all huddled around Kara’s phone, watching the short videos. And the more of them Lena watches, the more some of their stranger interactions start to make sense.

_Now_ she understands why Winn was put in timeout on top of the refrigerator, and Kara on the TV stand.

Now she knows that Lucy had ‘yeeted’ the juice carton at Winn because of a Vine, with a capital ‘V’.

Now she understands why a large group of _any-fucking-thing_ is playfully called ‘chickens’.

And surrounded by these people laughing and sharing their own favorites, Kara pressed tight to her side, laughing loudly in her ear and soaking her entire left side since she hadn’t bothered to towel off… This feels a lot like home, and like family.

It reminds her of Christmakah, odd as that sounds, since they’re all in swimsuits and it’s 80 degrees and there’s no snow for about 1,000 miles. But even still, the first time she really felt this was with _these_ people, and it hasn’t faded at all in the year since. Despite many trials and tribulations along the way.

_“Freesh- hahahaha- freesh avaca-doo!”_

And as she watches them laugh so hard they wheeze and tear up, she commits this moment to memory; Clark leaning over the back of her chair to poke at Kara’s phone, a hand strong enough to crush steel like tissue resting easily on her shoulder to help him keep his balance (she’d been amused and surprised to learn that he and Kara don’t fake being clumsy as part of their cover- they just _are_ clumsy), Lucy yelling out a request from her perch on James’ lap, Winn bouncing like an excited puppy beside her, Alex and Maggie flicking beads of water at everyone, Lois acting above it all and laying just barely in the sun- though the smirk tugging at her lips gives her away.

Someone yells, and Kara yells back, too loud in Lena’s ear, and then they’re all bickering over the definitive _Best Vine Ever_ , and Lena’s never had such a good time at the pool.

********

As it turns out, Lena’s favorite Vine ends up being one by a comedian playing a keyboard synth.

_“Is there anything better than pussy? Yes; a really good book.”_

She laughs so hard she has to sit down when Maggie sends it to her weeks later.

She loves her family.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This popped into my head at about 3:47 am while I was (shocker) watching old Vine compilation videos, and I swear I'm working on actual stuff for the Hallmark series, but I had so much fun writing this dumb piece of fluff that I just had to post it.


End file.
